Palace of the Plains tenative
by Lucifi
Summary: The Gang must enter the dreamrealm of a comatose boy in order to keep the First from finding a new powersource


J. Miller

Disclaimer – Plot line is mine… All others belong to Joss Whedon

No Ships

Takes place directly after episode "Never Leave Me" which is 7.9

Part One

City In a Dream

     Buffy waited.  The newborn vampire was struggling out its grave, clawing at the dirt and grunting as it pulled itself out of the ground.  She had wanted to stake it as soon as its back was fully exposed, but tonight she felt the need for a fight.  There hadn't been much going on since they had come and taken Spike and they hadn't had any luck in finding him either.  She wanted something to hurt and strike at.

     The vampire stood up and then fell to the ground again, letting out a pathetic mewling sound.  It looked at her and Buffy had to stop herself.  The girl was blond and looked a lot like her.  The girl vampire was struggling to stand again, only to fall down.  The vampire looked up at her and Buffy had a moment of déjà vu.  The girl's eyes were glazed over and her hands were wet with blood.

     "Oh God."  Was all she could get out as the feeling that this girl had actually been buried alive came over her?  She took a step closer to the girl and waited.  The female vampire simply looked at her, still apparently stunned.

     "Do you know your name?"  She asked.

     "Name?  No, uhm yes, its Tamara.  I, what am I doing here?"  The girl struggled and then finally stood up.  She swayed and Buffy stayed still.

     The girl moved slowly towards a gravestone and stopped, holding herself up.  She stared at the sky for a moment and then let herself slide down to the ground and rolled her head so she was looking at Buffy.  She sighed and then sobbed.

     "Something's wrong with that one."

     "They don't normally do that do they?"

     Buffy whirled around and saw Andrew and Dawn watching the scene from behind her.  First she was angry and then she decided that either way, they weren't in much trouble.  Andrew would run with the first sign of danger and Dawn had shown that she could handle herself until Buffy had a chance to help her.  She gave them a scowl though and they both shut up.  Andrew pretended to look at the sky.

     "Both of you just stay there.  I don't know what's going on with this vampire."

     "Buffy!"  Dawn cried out.

     She whirled around just as Tamara was coming up behind her and she kicked the female in the gut.  The girl grunted and crumpled to the ground crying.  Dawn had been right in her comment, something was wrong with this vampire.  She decided not to waste any more time and she put the stake through the girl's back and pulled away horrified.  Blood seeped up from the hole in Tamara's spine and she was bleating out a horrible death cry.

     "Oh God, she wasn't a vampire!"  Andrew made a wretched sound and ran behind a tree.

     "Buffy?"  Dawn asked cautiously.

     Buffy didn't answer her, but instead pushed the body over with her foot.  The girl was crying and she looked at Buffy with full confusion on her face.  Then it happened.  The body exploded in a shower of dust and the stake fell to the ground.  She picked up the stake and dropped it when she realized that there was still blood on it.

     "Buffy, I don't get it.  They don't do that do they?  I mean bleed and wait to die?"  Dawn was looking at the ground where the body had been with horrid fascination.

     "I don't know, Dawn.  Too many sketchy things have been happening.  Whatever the Big Bad has up its sleeve, it seems to be taking its toll on other things around here.  I'll talk to Willow when we get back.  She seems to have some bigger connection in all this."

     She took Dawn by the arm and headed off towards the entrance to the cemetery.  She got five feet when she felt the air around her deepen and begin to smell like ozone.  Andrew was coming up from behind them, but backwards and pointing at something forming in the air.  Buffy made both of them get behind her and she took an aggressive stance.

     The air was thickening in front of her, forming a rippling pool of misty air.  It swirled and coalesced into what looked like a giant mirror hanging in front of them.  Then the reflection went from her and the other two to a scene that took her breath away.  Whatever this thing was, it wasn't doing anything but showing her somewhere else, somewhere beautiful that seemed to come straight out of a dream.

     A sea of deep green grass rolled out in front of them.  As far as she could see in the vision, a great plain of green grass as tall as her waist rolled like an ocean.  Far in the distance she could make out what looked like a great crescent ring of mountains.  Suddenly the vision shifted, and she realized she was looking down from the mountains at what appeared to be a great silver city.  She could just make out carts moving along the roadways and she thought she saw people moving around what looked like a great bazaar.

     She wanted to reach out and touch the vision and to be there, in that silver city.  She felt that there, anyone could live happily and not worry about vampires and demons and First Evils.  She lifted her hands to the vision and cried out when a wisp of the mist touched her and she felt the clean green grass of those plains.  She suddenly felt though, deep inside that beautiful land, an evil that had started like a small unnoticeable cancer and was growing.  Wherever this place was, it needed her.  Then it collapsed upon itself and was gone.

     "What was that?"  Andrew asked in a whisper.

     "Where was that?"  Dawn corrected him.

     "I don't know, but I think we need to talk to Willow and now."

* * *

     "Willow."

     The voice was soft in her ear a whisper that sounded like the waist high grass that she stood in.  All around her, a great plain of the greenest grass she had ever seen rolled and waved and sighed at her.  She was in love with the quiet and blue sky, the soft whisper of the breeze through the blades.  She was also in love with it because she couldn't feel what was beneath her other than the ground.  Nothing with teeth lurked somewhere deep and dark and hidden.

     "Willow."

     She recognized the voice and she turned slowly around.  She choked back a sob and crossed her arms over her chest.  She wanted nothing more than to run and grabbed the figure up in her arms, but the blood and hole in the chest stopped her.  The memories of Cassie stopped her as well.

     "Tara?"  She asked cautiously.  She wanted this to be her, the real her.  She didn't want it to be some trick thought of by some formless evil that attacked with emotions and lies.

     "Yes, but not for long.  This has to be quick.  Too much power has already been put into contacting others.  This place needs you, Willow.  It needs you, Buffy, the others.  I don't have long to show you places you need to be."  Tara held out her hand to Willow and waited.

     Willow unfolded her hands from her chest and reached out to take Tara's.  She feared that her hand would pass through, but it didn't.  Tara squeezed and Willow watched as the blood faded away and the hole in her chest closed and vanished.  She grabbed her then and held Tara tight to her.  She felt the tears coming and Tara kissed her eyes.

     Suddenly they were moving through the plains of grass towards what appeared to be a great city seated at the base of what looked like a mountain range.  They moved faster and she found herself literally flying through the city itself towards a palace like nothing she had imagined.  It was huge and was the size of a city in itself.  Then they stopped at the doors of the great palace.

     "This is the Palace of the Plains, it is the heart of the land.  As people live and die here, the Palace lives.  Only with people moving and playing here, does this Palace survive.  This is where you must come.  This is where you must start your search."  Tara was sitting on the steps and smiling at Willow as she took in the city around her.

     "Is this Heaven?"  Willow asked.

     "No.  It could be, but it isn't.  This place, this land and the people of this world would believe it is though.  You must get here quickly.  You have no time to waste.  As in the world, something devours the power of the land from beneath and within."

     "The First Evil?"

     "No.  Though if you're not careful, it will find this place and it will feed off its strength and energy.  It will become stronger."

     "Tara, how do I find this place?"

     Willow could not imagine do anything at that moment, but protecting this world from the First Evil.  This place was a Heaven, even if not the one she knew of.  She concentrated and found she could feel the earth beneath her and she could feel something deep within, small but there.  Something that would continue to eat and take and destroy this world.   She opened her eyes and was startled to find herself in the Sunnydale Hospital.  Tara was standing over the sleeping body of a young man.

     "This is the boy who's world you must enter.  You must come to him, for he has sent me to find you.  He knows of us, all of us.  He has watched as we grew up and fought and survived.  He knows that you have what it takes to help him.  He calls out to you in the only way he can."

     Willow stepped closer to the boy and wondered how a boy could be the center of an entire world.  She reached out and brushed a hair away from the eyes.  The boy was locked away, somewhere deep inside him and had somehow created a Heaven of his own.  She looked at Tara.

     "No!"  She reached out and her hand passed through Tara.

     "Your dream is coming to an end Willow.  I can't stay and I won't be back.  You've got to come here.  To this boy, where you will enter and leave."

     "Tara, don't.  It's been so hard without you.  I need you with me."  Willow felt tears falling and Tara smiled at her.

     "You're strong Willow.  You're the strongest I have met and we will be together again somehow, someway.  For now though, you've got something you need to do."  Then she was gone and Willow was awake in her bed.  She rolled over and pulled her body into a fetal position.  She could still feel Tara squeezing her hand.

* * *

     "I can't believe this stuff.  Do these people even know what they're talking about?"  Anya was seated on the couch, popcorn bowl beside her, scowling at the television.

     "I don't know, but these people obviously don't know anything about Sunnydale or the Hellmouth."  Xander told her, sitting at the opposite end of the couch.

     They had been watching television for three hours now and the only thing they could find that they agreed upon was a special on The Learning Channel called "Vampires Among Us."  Nothing much else had been on and Anya had refused to let Xander watch Black Hawk Down.  She grunted again and scowled some more at the television, stuffing a handful of popcorn into her mouth.

     "Who are these people?  Where do they live?  I can just see it now.  The first one of these idiots to see a real vampire and they would just faint away.  Then they would be vampires.  Real Vampires."

     "That stuff about Dracula, that was crap."  Xander stated.  He wished something else had been on.  Anything but this.  He felt like calling up the The Learning Channel and asking them to come out and do a real show on all the stuff in Sunnydale.  That would educate people.

     "Xander, turn the channel back."  Anya pointed at the television.  He looked at the screen and saw that it wasn't on the special anymore.

     "I didn't change it.  You have the remote by you."

     "Well, I didn't change…" She stopped and stared at the screen.  Xander turned and looked as well.  He sat there, silent and awed by the view that he was being showed.

     Whatever was happening, the television was glowing and inside the glow was a scene of a plain of rolling green grass.  In the background, three full moons hung in the sky, bright enough to see everything by, almost as if the sun had turned silver.  Far in the background rose a great range of mountains in the shape of a crescent moon.

     "Xander?"

     "I don't know, Anya."

     The channel seemed to flip by itself and they were looking at a great city of silver.  They watched as people moved about the streets lit by floating blue-white lights.  Everything seemed to glow with the light.  The channel flipped again and they were looking at the massive black doors leading into a palace.  As if they were still watching a special, an announcer began to speak.

     "This is the heart of the city itself.  Ruled over by the High Queen, it presides over the entirety of the lands.  All things begin and end here, like a great circle.  It is also here that travelers first come and present themselves to the High Queen, Sierra de Mora.

     Many a foreign traveler has come and become one of the Queen's guard, seeking to settle down and live within the walls of Ninniya."

     "Xander, this isn't Must See TV."

     "I know, Anya."

     "Anyanka."  The voice flowed from the television in a whisper and Anya jumped.

     "Hey isn't that Halle?"  Xander asked as the woman moved into the frame.

     Anya looked back at the television and was amazed to see Halle standing there.  She smiled at Anya.  She pointed towards the massive doors and motioned for the camera to zoom in on her.

     "I don't blame you for what happened, Anyanka.  It wasn't your fault that he tricked you.  He would have done something similar to me had I requested such a thing.  But enough of that, you need to get yourself here, dear.  This place needs you and Xander, and the others.  Don't wait though, reservations are filling up quickly.  Other people that don't deserve to see this place are waiting in line to purchase tickets as we speak."

     "Halle?"

     "Don't wait, Anyanka.  Things are already set in motion in this place and there is little time for hemming and hawing and I have to go."

     "Don't go, wait, I need to know something."  Anya fell off the couch and moved towards the television.  Halle's eyes followed her and she smiled.

     "Yes, you did the right thing.  Now stop questioning yourself and be a good girl and get yourself here."

     White snow filled the television and the glowing faded.  Xander sat there and watched Anya cry for a moment.  He wanted nothing more than to go to her and hold her.  He wanted nothing more than to be able to tell Anya in someway that Halle had been right, that Anya had done the right thing.  Only he couldn't.  He felt that the message on the television had been for both of them, but somehow, it was really meant for Anya.

     "Where's Buffy, we need to talk to her.  I need to talk to her, now."

     "What do you need to talk to me about?"

     "Buffy!  You wouldn't believe what we just saw."  Xander said.

     "I have a feeling I would.  It wouldn't happen to be something like a great city made of what looked like silver built on a great plain of green grass at the base of a mountain range shaped like a crescent moon?"

     "Did you see the same special?"  Xander asked.

     "What special?  Dawn, Andrew and I saw it through a mirror while in the cemetery.  Where did you see it?"

     "We saw it on the TV.  We were watching this horribly misinformed special about vampires and then Halle told us we had to be somewhere.  That somewhere."  She informed Buffy.

     "So it wasn't just a dream?"  Willow asked, coming down the stairs.

     "You saw it too?"  Dawn asked.

     "Yeah, I dreamed about it.  Tara told me that we didn't have long to get wherever this place is and do something."

     "It's called Ninniya.  The announcer on the special told us."  Anya told them.

     "Where is this place?  I mean it's obviously not here."  Andrew moved and sat at one of the chairs in the dinning room.  He looked at them and waited.

     "Tara showed me a young guy over at the Sunnydale Hospital.  She said it was where we would enter and we would leave.  All of us, even Andrew."

     "Tara showed you?"

     "Yeah, she was there in my dream.  She said that she was being asked by something else to get our attention.  I thought maybe it was just a dream, but then you all were seeing something as well.  I guess we have something to do, somewhere to go."

     "Yeah.  Wherever this place is, it's in trouble and I think that if the Big Bad finds it, it will get even worse.  I think that it could use it, like a power source."  Buffy told them.

     "Then a guess we need to see a boy about a world."  Dawn said, grabbing her jacket and opening the front door.

     "Spike, wake up.  A girl's got things to do, people to find.  I can't wait around all day for you."

     He opened his eyes slowly, the pain running through his body like an electrical current.  He wanted nothing more than to close them again, to put the sight of the opened seal out of his head.  He wanted back into his dreams where a great city of silver waited.  It had been beautiful, shinning bright in the sunlight.  He wanted to put the sight of Glory out of the way and only think of that place.

     She was pacing.  It was pacing.  It was pacing in the form of Glory and he thought that the figure suited it.  She looked at him and smiled.  It was that smile that told him she knew something.  She approached him where he still hung from the Da Vinci cross.  She looked up at him with pity on her face and he wanted to spit.

     "Now, it seems something's going on, Spike.  Somebody borrowed energy that wasn't there's and I want to know what could be so important that they had to steal my energy."

     "Can't help you there."  He told her.

     "Oh, but maybe you can.  I think you can tell me what you were dreaming about.  I felt it there, inside you love."  Druscilla told him.

     "You aren't really her.  You aren't really any of them."

     "Oh my lost poet.  You've gone and done something naughty.  Dreams belong to those who have souls and you reek of lost worlds and spirits that don't like to play nicely."

     "Spike.  Tell me what's inside there.  It's killing you to hold it in.  You can't keep this up forever."

     He stared at the form of Buffy and closed his eyes to it.  Of all of them, this one was the worse.  It was this form that he dreaded above the rest.  He didn't know how the First Evil could take their likenesses so well.  All the rest were also dead and Buffy had died but had been resurrected.  He thought maybe that the First could only take on the form of people who had died and been in the ground.  It was the only thing that could explain Buffy's and Druscilla's forms.  Either that, or it just used whatever form was most effective.

     "Spike, pay attention to me.  Now the way I see it, is that we have two things possibly going on here.  Either there's a new witch in town or somebody's crossing worlds.  I'm thinking though that either way, were just going to have to put a stop to that."  Mayor Wilkins told him.

     "I told you, I don't know what you're talking about."

     "Sparky, you disappoint me.  Here I was thinking that you were the one and this was going to be easy.  It's not going to be easy now."

     Warren approached even closer and looked into him.  He felt a strange tingling along with the pain and then the pain arched through him.  He cried out and his muscles pulled tight against the ropes holding him.  Deep inside his mind a red spray blossomed and the collapsed and formed a pool.  Inside the pool, distorted and hazy, the memory of the silver city formed.  It was horrible seeing it that way, looking at it through a pool of red that smeared what he had seen before.

     "Where is this place?  This isn't a place that I know of."  Buffy asked him.

     "I told you I don't know, bitch."

     "Such language.  Go back to sleep Spike.  Go back to sleep and dream of this place again for me.  That's my boy."

     He couldn't help it then and he felt the weight in his eyelids, though now he wanted desperately to keep them open.  He had been used enough and now the First would use him again to find that place.  That place where he had stood in the sun in his dream.

     All six of them stood outside the hospital looking at the entrance.  They had gotten this far and then Andrew had reminded them that getting into somebody's room at one in the morning was not allowed.  Visitor hours and the such.

     "Couldn't you just make us invisible or something, Willow?"  Dawn asked her.

     "I don't know.  I could try, but I could also end up just making you disappear period."  She told her.

     "You could always try it on him first."  Anya said, pointing towards Andrew.

     "Stop it."  Buffy told them.  "We have to get in there.  Maybe one at a time we could get in, but we don't know what to expect when we do find him.  I'm not sure, but I don't think I want to be found by orderlies in the morning."

     "Wait.  What about that spell you cast to reach Buffy?  The one where you went into her mind while she was in shock."

     "That was easy though Xander, she was sitting right in front of me.  I would need something from him.  Something that would allow me to make a connection with him."

     "What about hair?  Or maybe some drool.  He's comatose, so there's got to be drool."

     Willow looked at Anya and then at the hospital.  Anya was partially right, hair might work, but she needed to be close to the boy.  Though she realized that no matter where they were, they would be asleep in order to enter that place, all of them.  That would mean that for however long they were out, they were vulnerable.

     "I could possibly use the hair, but we would need to be somewhere safe.  We would need to be somewhere that nothing could get at us.  We don't have Spike or Angel or Giles to watch out for us."  They stood there in silence, each one of them trying to come up with some safe place for all of them to be.

     "Why don't you just go in, take him out and then go somewhere?"  Amy asked as she stepped up next to Willow.

     "What are you doing here?"  Willow asked taking a step away from the other witch.

     "Not that suggestions aren't good, but what are you doing here?"  Buffy asked her.

     "Strange dreams, Tara, boy in a coma.  Seems I'm not the only one.  Of course, Tara did say that there would be others to help."  Amy looked at all of them one at a time.

     "And where would you suggest we take him?  Last time I checked, this thing chasing us could be anywhere.  And I thought you were a rat."  Anya put her hands up as Amy gave her a dirty look.

     "Look, as I understood it we don't have much time.  While we're standing out here looking like gap commercial we could at least try and think of something constructive."

     "Amy's right.  Willow, Amy and you have the best chance of using your powers to get in and get out the least detected.  While you're doing that, the rest of us will keep watch and think of someplace that is the least likely to be found."  Buffy gave Willow the best impression of her own resolve face.

     Willow smiled and suddenly felt a lot better.  She realized again what she had repeatedly figured out in the past.  The whole group was much better at getting things done when bad jokes were being passed around.  It seemed to take the edge off the whole dangerous and killed aspect of the things they got themselves into.  She headed off towards the hospital entrance walking slowly enough for Amy to keep up.

     She didn't want Amy there.  The so called birthday present from Amy had put here on edge and had done nothing more than set her back.  None of the others had blamed her for what had happened, none of them had really said much about it at all.  Looking back though she saw what Amy had done was nothing more than extension of how she had felt about magic then.  How could it be dangerous?  Why don't you just enjoy everything that you could do with it?  She of course knew now exactly why you didn't.

     "Okay, we need to think of places to go that no one can find us while we do whatever it is that we have to do."  Buffy told them.  She herself was fresh out of ideas.  They had no one to watch over them and apparently the only other person powerful enough to possibly watch over them was going with them.

     "I think I know a place we could go, but Willow won't like it."  Dawn said, her face pinched and excited.

     "Where, Dawn?"

     "Rac's place."

     "Oh."  Buffy frowned and looked at Anya and Xander.  They both shook there heads.

     "Okay, so it's stationary right now, because it's kinda like a ship.  It used to move around all the time when someone magical was actually there.  It didn't seem to matter whether they were awake or not.  The pilot.  If we go there, it would start to move around again.  It would be hard to find us and with two witches, they should be able to put up magical wards, right?"  Dawn stopped and took a breath.  She blurted the suggestion out because she knew she was right and she didn't want any of the others to stop her in the middle of her sentence.

     "Okay, I just want to know really, why are we doing this?  I know that we're the good guys and this is what we're supposed to do."  Anya waited, chewing on her thumb.

     "But, why?  Because we all know that his place is magical.  If not for the boy, if not for the people that live in that world, then for us.  We all know that this place can be harnessed, at least that was the impression.  We also know that if the First Evil gets a hold of this place, it will give huge amounts of power to feed on."  Buffy told her.  She didn't know if she really cared about the boy or the people in that dreamworld, but she knew the last part was right.  They could not let the First get ahold of that power.

     "And we do, Anya, because we are the good guys."  Xander said with a sigh.  Then he looked at Anya and to where Amy and Willow had gone.  "I think."

     "So how are we going to do this?"

     "I don't know.  You and I need to get upstairs, steal a comatose boy out of his bed and then run.  I don't do this very often, so I don't really keep a set of plans for this sort of thing stored in memory."  Willow scowled at the closed bathroom door.  They had gotten to the second floor area and had ducked into the women's bathroom when they had seen an orderly coming.

     "Why are you so touchy?  You obviously have gotten over the "I don't do magic" thing.  And don't try and hold anything against me.  I have my reasons for doing that little thing for you last year.  I won't apologize for it."  Amy was sitting on a toilet wishing desperately that she had something sweet in her hands.  She blinked and a chocolate cookie appeared.  She munched on it somberly as she gave Willow time to think.

     "I'm touchy because of what you did, Amy.  Things got way out of hand, and when you should have been there to help me, you didn't.  Whether you are going to apologize or not, you should have at least been my friend and left the magic out."

     "I did leave you alone.  After you threatened me."

     Willow sighed.  She didn't think her and Amy were ever going to be the best of friends, but they were going to need each other for this.  She didn't want to fight her right now.  Though something deep inside seemed to itch to get out and do something.  She knew that side and she quelled it hard and fast.   It wouldn't do to be having an all out witch war in the pediatric ward of the hospital.

     "Okay, so this is what we do.  We make ourselves look like orderlies and we just waltz and take the boy.  Who's really going to stop us, Willow?"

     "Good point.  Okay.  Go ahead, change us."

     "Okay.  I will."

     "Okay then."

     "Circe, hear me, bring to us a great glamour to hold the form of another!"  Amy passed her hand over her face and down her body and Willow watched as the magic took hold and she was now looking at the orderly that they had seen in hallway.

     "Okay, now you're a black boy.  Say something."

     "What would you have me say?"  The voice came out rich and masculine and Willow smiled.  The calling had worked.

     "Now your turn."  Amy passed her hand over Willow's face and body, calling on Circe again changing Willow into one of the emergency room desk clerks they had seen coming into the hospital.

     "Okay, so, do we know what room he's in?"  Amy asked.

     "No, but I do know that he's up on the third floor.  Well at least I think so.  Not so much in words, but I got the feeling that's where he is."

     "Let's go."

     "What's taking them so long?"  Andrew whined.  He had pretty much been silent until now, but he was getting a creepy feeling that things were about to go wrong.

     "Oh, just the fact that they're stealing someone from the hospital."  Xander told him.

     The look from Xander told Andrew to pretty much shut his mouth.  He didn't like Xander much, always so arrogant and pushy.  Well, not pushy he realized, but something about Xander got under his skin and made him itch.  He wanted out of here and he stood up to move around.  Maybe he was just restless, but he didn't think so.  To much had happened lately for him to ignore the instincts that were lighting on fire.

     "Something's wrong.  We need to get out of here."  He told Buffy, ignoring Xander's looks.

     "Sit down.  I'm jumpy too, but we have to wait for Willow and Amy.  Now just sit down."

     "Yeah, don't make me get rough with you again, buster."  Anya told him.

     "Is it him?"  Amy asked.

     "Yeah this is him.  We need to get out of here, I think we've been found."  Willow looked out the window and spotted the black robes moving silently towards the rest of the gang.

     "Teleport, it's the only way fast enough to get out of here.  What's going on down there?"  Amy was picking up the young man, half amused that while she wouldn't have been able to pick him up as herself, the young man she had taken the form of could.

     "They have company.  Okay, just make sure you're touching me."  Willow made sure that Amy and the boy were both touching skin with her and then swung her hand around herself.  There was a brief moment when she thought it hadn't worked when he stomach lurched and she was standing next to a very startled Dawn.

     "Time to go Buffy, did you figure out a place?"

     "Willow?  Which one of you is Willow?"

"No time Buffy,  we have company,"  Willow told her motioning her head behind her.

"Rac's."  Buffy told the female orderly.

"Uhm… I… okay, everyone hold hands."

All seven of them linked hands, Amy half holding the boy against her form.  Willow concentrated and felt the spinning inside her.  It was heavy though, not like when it was just her and Buffy or her and Amy.  Eight people were basically weighing down the boat and it was taking longer to get them to Rac's old place.  She also thought maybe that it was taking longer, because she really didn't want to go there.  When she opened her eyes, the blind monks with their weapons were just fading out and the walls of the room were slowly coming into form.  One of the Fallen Monks tried to stab at Buffy, but his blade passed right through her.  She didn't stop the spell until she knew they were just spinning in place inside the red room.  When she let go of them, she fell to the ground and began to dry heave.

* * *

     "Where have they gone, Sparky?"

     "I don't know!"

     "Where could you go, that I wouldn't be able to find you?"  Warren stood there, looking up at Spike, calmly analyzing the problem at hand.

     "God, what do you want with me?  Just kill me already."  Spike told him.

     "No.  I have plans for you yet.  I haven't quite figured them out yet, but I have plans for you."

     Warren paced back and forth.  First, something steals energy and magic to break barriers to show that stupid gang some dream world.  Then those two witches manage to steal the very person the dream world was born from and teleport to someplace that can't be found.  It was confusing and frustrating and now once again, they were keeping something that didn't belong to them.

     "Hey you."  Glory pointed at one of the Fallen Monks that was stationed by the door.  "I want you to go out and find me someone who knows about these things.  Better yet, find me someone who might actually help us find them.  I don't want to waste time torturing someone for information."

     "You won't find them.  If the Big Bad can't find them now, with all it's power, how do you expect to find them later?"  Spike spat blood out onto the ground near Glory.

     "That was just, rude."

     She stepped up to him and punch him solidly in the jaw.  He was out cold and she felt somewhat satisfied.  She wished she didn't have to keep him around, but something told her that he was still needed.  She couldn't kill him yet.  She also realized that she had given the monk a very general order and would probably have to go after it in order to speed things up.  Otherwise she would probably waiting a very long time.  They weren't that intelligent, mostly just automatomous.

     She looked at the vampire that was currently waiting for some kind of direction or order.  It had been woken up and fed, but not given anything to do.  There was nothing for it to do right though.  The very people that she was going to use it against were now completely off her scope.  She hoped soon thought that she would have something for it to do.

     "You don't just raise something this evil and keep it as a conversational piece."  She told the unconscious Spike.

     "Willow?"

     "I'm alright Buffy, I just need a moment."

     Willow was laid out on the couch and Buffy had the feeling that her friend wasn't alright.  They had chosen the place more on a whim and faith rather than any real investigation.  It was a place that didn't have good memories for Willow and they had forced her to come here unprepared.  Even Buffy didn't feel all that comfortable.  This was where they had begun to fight after Willow had been attempting to draw Dawn's true form into herself.

     Both of the girls had become themselves again and Amy had begun the process of putting up wards against anyone who would try and enter the place.  It was true what Dawn had said as well, the place seemed to need only magical people in it to start moving again.  She had looked out the window twice to see two separate views of Sunnydale.  The first had been by the waterfront and the second somewhere in downtown a few stories up.

     "That was quite the ride.  I don't know what kind of teleportation that was, but I've never felt that disoriented afterwards."  Anya said.

     "Yeah.  Six Flags has nothing on our Willow."  Xander commented.

     "So now what do we do?"  Andrew asked.  He was still feeling the effects of the teleportation spell and was curled up in a corner.

     "We wait until Willow's ready and then I suppose we do what we were asked to do."

     "Yeah, as if anyone had an idea of what we're supposed to do."

     "Look, Willow knows.  She was told basically what to do.  At least that's the impression I got from what she said about what Tara told her.  Other than that, Andrew, we sit and we wait."

     Xander got up from where he was and went to where Buffy and Willow were seated.  He had no idea what was about to happen.  All he knew was that some guy who was still in a coma and seemed to be able to survive without the aid of medical machinery was asking them from some dream world to come and help him.  It wasn't like the boy they had found who had been projecting his dreams out into the real world.

     "Willow, do we know, do you know what we're supposed to do?"  He asked her.

     "I think so.  I think that all we have to do is join together and go into his dream.  Something similar to what I did with Buffy."  She sat up and looked at them all.  It was time.  They couldn't wait any longer.

     Okay, she thought, were coming.  She gathered them around the body of the boy and made them all hold hands.  If she was going to do this, then she would have to use all of their powers to break any barriers that were up protecting the boy.  She imagined he had powerful wards and doors to keep out things that didn't belong and only hoped that because they had all been called, that it wouldn't be difficult.  She waited until they were all calm and quieted.

     "Hecate, here me.  Let us who are on the outside join with that which is inside of this boy."  As she said the words, each one of them began to feel the pull of sleep on them.  Xander's head dropped, followed by Anya and then the rest of them were pulled into a deep slumber.

     Willow opened her eyes.  All seven of them were there, stunned but there.  The room didn't look any different.  She let go of Buffy and Amy and stood up.  She thought she had done it but there was nothing here to show it had worked.

     "Willow, did it work?  We look the same, this is the same place.  Did you call upon the right goddess?"  Anya was touching her face, pushing at her cheeks as if she thought they might bend of reshape themselves.

     "Well, I thought it did."

     "Willow, where's the boy?"  Dawn asked, pointing to the empty spot where the body had been.

     Andrew was about to ask if she had accidently sent the boy off somewhere when the ground started to spin.  He watched in amazement with the others as a small whirlpool opened in the rug and began to grow.  He stepped away from it, sure now that she had opened some dimensional door to a hell world.  Dawn did the same, but the others were still staring at the rugpool when she turned and spotted the steel doors that had replaced the door of the room.

     "Hey, I think she did it."  She turned Buffy towards the doors.

     "So, then this must be like a waiting room.  Of sorts.  Only, which way is out and which way is in?"

     "Well, I think this is the way out."  Xander said as he tried to open the steel doors.

     "Yeah, must be one of those, you don't get out until I let you out type deals."  Andrew said.

     "So into the whirlpool?"  Buffy asked Willow.

     "Down the rabbit hole it is."  Amy said, taking a step forward and into the widening whirlpool.  She was gone instantly.

     "I don't think I like this."  Buffy said, but followed after Amy.

     "Everyone in."  Xander said, jumping in.

     One by one, the last of them went into the pool.  Willow waited until they had all gone and looked around.  She only hoped this was a simple way in and not a human shredder.  She looked at the walls, wanting some kind of reassurance that what she was doing was right.  Anything would have done, but the walls just watched her silently.  She stepped into the pool and held her breath.

     She instantly felt pulled in all directions, every cell of her body seemed to be everywhere at once.  She tried to cry out for the others, but silence was all she could give.  Something was in the blackness with her as well.  Something unfriendly and full of rage, something that was hunting her.  She pulled herself together, forcing herself to feel like one being again.  She pulled at it until she felt like she was nothing more than a speck of dust in the universe.  She would hide from this hunter until she could figure out what was going on.

_     No hiding, come forth._

     The power of the voice was incredible and it moved everywhere in the blackness.  She realized it was right, there was no hiding in this place from it.  This was it's home and it knew every bit of darkness in there.  She uncoiled herself and waited.  One way or another she would get out of this place, either back to the real world or onto the other place.  That place where the grass was emerald green and great waves of it rolled like and ocean.  To that palace of silver that looked like magic was nothing but common day life.

     Ah, the witch.  In Ninniya, you will be my force of destruction.  As with all things, you start here with birth.

     It found her then and embraced her, taking her into itself and feeding upon her, devouring her.  Again she wanted to scream, but nothing came out.  She thrashed and fought against the force taking her, but it simply kept going.  For an instant she thought she had completely screwed up and the thing from below was devouring her and she had delivered them all into the very mouth of madness.

     Eventually she knew nothing, eventually there was nothing of her left.  The darkness was all encompassing and something dark moved in the darkness.  And it waited.  Waited for the very people it had called upon to return to it.  They were the gods now, and they would bring the light with them.

     "What in hell was that?"  Andrew asked, sitting up in the grass.

     "I don't know, but are we all here?"  Buffy looked around her and took a head count.  All of them were there.

     She looked around her and took in the sight.  A tree that looked like it should have been in ancient days of dinosaurs rose high into the sky behind her.  Other than that they were sitting on what looked like a barren bluff, coarse sand underneath them.  It was either just going to be morning or it was just going to be night, she couldn't tell.  Willow was standing on the edge of the bluff looking out.

     "Hey Will, anything other than dirt over there?"  Xander called out to her.

     "Yeah.  Yeah I would say so.  I think the rest of you should come over here."

     Buffy looked at the others and shrugged.  She didn't suppose that it could really get any stranger than this.  She looked at Willow and decided that it could actually get stranger.  She saw that Willow was now longer wearing her jeans and sweater she had been, but was clad in a tight black clothing that looked like it was painted on to her.  Around her shoulders and down her arms a great body vest of black shiny material caught the wind and fluttered at her feet.  She looked down at her own clothes and saw that she was wearing a tight black outfit and that she was sitting on some kind of red jacket.

     "Yeah, we all got some new threads.  Some new looks too."  Xander told her as he came into her view.  He himself was wearing what looked to be leather pants and a leather jacket.

     "I like mine!"  Dawn said.  She was dressed in a tight white outfit with a blue body vest.  It was identical to Willow's except for the colors.

     They were actually dressed in a similar fashion, the only real difference were the main colors and ideas behind the outfits.  She could only guess that Willow's was the most extreme because she was the one who brought them here.

     "You guys!  Would you get over here!"  Willow turned and looked at them each.  All of them stood there and then went to her.  What they were greeted with took their breath away.

     They had not gone to the wrong place at all.  As each one of them looked out from the bluff, they realized they had started their journey some way up the crescent shaped mountains and below them was an ocean of green.  Below them as well, a great silver city sat in silence, apparently sleeping.

Buffy guessed that it would take half a day to get down to the city walls, but she figured that there was really nothing else to do.  There was no apparent way back to their world and she had a feeling there wouldn't be until they reached the conclusion of this adventure, either in death or beating whatever needed to be beat.

"Should we head down?"  Amy asked, looking around at all of them.  She was dressed in the same type of outfit as Dawn and Willow, but hers was in shades of greens and browns.

"I don't see a way up."

"Then down it is."  Willow said, walking to the small path that led away from the tree and outcropping.

The path continued down the mountain and Buffy realized that it was morning as the shadow of the mountain stretched farther out from them over the city.  She could only guess, but she figured that the sun would be straight down on them in a few hours.  She kept watch around them as they went.  She wasn't sure what kind of things roamed in this land and who knew what was really expected of them.  All she could be sure of is that dispite the cool new clothing and hair do's, nothing here was going to follow rules like they knew them.

     "Look at that!"  Dawn told them, pointing to what looked like a cross between a long eared rabbit and a tiger.

     "Whoa."  Andrew was dumbfounded.  He knew exactly what kind of creature was heading towards.

     "You say that like you might have seen something like this before?"  Xander asked.

     "Well, yeah.  It's a Croel.  Or at least I think it is."

     "And how do you know this?"  Amy asked him.

     "It's kinda a creature you find in roleplaying games.  I figure Xander should know about that type of stuff too."

     "You mean like Dungeons and Dragons type roleplaying?!"  Buffy asked him.

     "Yeah."


End file.
